GENUKI: Gloucestershire Record Office

Gloucestershire

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Archives and Libraries
in Gloucestershire

GLOUCESTERSHIRE RECORD OFFICE

Recent updates are marked

The Record Office's official web page provides details of location, hours of opening, publications and handlists, and their professional genealogical research service. They also provide two major resources to search online:-

Gloucestershire Record Office : Archives Online Catalogue
for a full catalogue of Anglican Parish Records in their keeping, and brief details of other collections they hold.

Gloucestershire Record Office : Genealogical Database
for details of Wills, Gloucester Prison Records and Non-Conformist Registers.

NB: Whilst the above links work at time of last update (6 Jul 2003) I suspect they may be somewhat 'volatile'. If for any reason they don't take you to the expected place, please go to the Gloucestershire County Council's Home Page and search for "Record Office", then try navigating from there.

The remainder of this web page offers a brief personal walk-through of GRO services based on my own visits there.
If you are planning to arrive by car, there is a free car park with plenty of parking space, which is easy to reach from most of the main thoroughfares. For instance, if you approach from the A38 Tewkesbury direction, cross the Inner Ring towards the city centre, and look out for a Gloucester Record Office sign on your left. The turn is just after a zebra crossing, and just before a bridge over the road where the railway crosses over. The office is however also within comfortable walking distance of the bus and rail stations, various multi-story car parks, and of the City Centre.
The entrance to the Record Office is on the left of the building. Once inside, you can hang up coats, and deposit any bags in the lockers provided before entering the Search Room. As with all Record Offices you will need a pencil, so remember to take that, and your notepad out of your bag before you turn the key in the locker.
The reception desk is to the right of the entrance, just past the lockers. The first time you visit you will, as usual, be required to provide some means of identification, which includes your home address - a driving licence will do nicely.
After you've booked in, it's likely the first thing you'll want to do is to search parish registers. This is very easy, as most of the original parish registers which have been deposited are available for searching on a self-service basis, on microfiche. Look for the microfilm reader room, where you will find carousels of fiche for the asking, and indeed you could spend a very happy day in this room alone. At present, there is no need to book a reader, and photocopier is available for taking prints from fiche.
Many more of the Record Office resources are available now on microfiche than when I first began visiting (1985). On my most recent visit (August 2001) I found a room newly opened containing microfiche of the Civil Registration Indexes, 1837-1996, and Calendars of Probate, from 1858 onwards. The latter are fiche copies of those records held formerly at Somerset House and now at the Probate Dept of The Principal Registry Family Division: Probate Search Room, First Avenue House, 42-49 High Holborn, London, WC1V 6NP. You can obtain more information about post-1858 Wills, and forms for obtaining copies by post on the Government's "Court Service" Wills & Probate pages.
Look out also for the Record Office's new (in May 2001) Genealogical Database, of Wills, Gloucester Gaol Records and Non-Conformist Registers (now also online). Copies of original Wills on microfilm/fiche, the International Genealogical Index (IGI) for Gloucestershire and surrounding counties, and Census returns for Gloucestershire on microfilm are all available on a self-service basis.
In terms of recent history, the first ever index to the 1851 Census was a slip index, one slip per person. Details recorded were surname, forenames and ages, with the place, and census reel number(s) in which they occurred. A significant undertaking, this was compiled by inmates of Gloucester Prison! More recently, the 1851 Gloucestershire Census has been transcribed in full by the Gloucestershire Family History Society, and is available for purchase on microfiche, or CD.
The Record Office also hold a wide range of lists and indexes, including copies of Phillimore's Marriage Register transcripts, Roe's Marriage Indexes, and a printed copy of the Gloucestershire Family History Society's Marriage Index, 1800-37. Of note also on open shelves are 19th Century Directories, Ralph Bigland's 4-volume work covering Memorial Inscriptions, and some of the printed indexes to PCC Wills.
I can also recommend the PERSONAL NAME INDEX, a card-slip index with information one might never find otherwise. There is also an overall SUBJECT INDEX, and PLACE INDEX (particularly useful for finding Parish Reference Material.
There is also a name index to Overseers of the Poor papers. I didn't have time to check the coverage, but can verify that, for instance, the Settlement Certificate of John REEVES to Cam from Coaley in 1769 is indexed, on his name and also on his wife Hester's and their children's, Martha and Mary. Wonderful!
Whilst the main sources of reference for family historians may be parish registers, wills and census, the Record Office contains over 8 million source documents of potential use to family historians, dating from Domesday to the present day, and ranging from Parish Chest papers (Settlement, Bastardy Orders, &c.) to papers deposited by local solicitors, tradesmen's accounts and collections of old photographs - there are endless possibilities to be explored. Overall, the information is well presented and the staff are friendly and helpful.
Enjoy your visit - I think you will!

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[Last updated 24 Nov 2009 - 12:27 by Rosemary Lockie]